Stewart: Keystone Pipeline is in nation’s best interest

Washington, D.C. – Rep. Chris Stewart, chairman of the Subcommittee on Environment, led a key hearing Tuesday, moving one step closer to getting the Keystone XL Pipeline approved.

The Keystone pipeline would bring crude oil from the Tar Sands of Alberta, Canada, to refineries of the gulf coast in the United States. Tuesday’s joint Environment and Energy Subcommittee hearing reviewed the environmental and science aspects of the Keystone XL project, with a specific focus on the recently released Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement by the U.S. Department of State.

“The subject of today’s hearing, the XL pipeline, has been under continuous review for more than four years,” Stewart said Tuesday. “In that time we have learned that the project is safe, environmentally sound, that it will create jobs and that it promotes energy security.”

In its Statement, the state department affirmed that the Keystone XL project would potentially support approximately 42,000 jobs across the United States. This employment would translate to approximately $2.05 billion in earnings, helping working families across the United States.

“President Obama frequently urges us to reduce our reliance on foreign oil from unstable, undemocratic regimes that are unfriendly to U.S. interests,” Stewart said. “As a former Air Force pilot, I have personal knowledge of how important it is to reduce our reliance on sources of energy that emanate from instable and unpredictable areas of the world. If you want to enhance our national security, while decreasing the need to put our sons and daughters in harm’s way in far off regions of the world, then build the Keystone pipeline.”

Regarding the project’s safety, the state department’s report found the Keystone XL project to be safe, and even said that it would be one of the safest ever built and operated. The report went on to say that there would be no significant impacts on the environment.

“In short, building the pipeline,” Stewart said, “is in the nation’s best interest and there is no logical reason not to allow it to move forward.”

Submitted by the office of Rep. Chris Stewart

Email: [email protected]

Twitter: @STGnews

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2 Comments

  • philiplo May 9, 2013 at 10:59 am

    Mr. Stewart’s statistics conflict with those from other sources. Which section of the EIS show these 42,000 jobs he mentions? Those against the pipeline quote the same document (State Department EIS) as saying only 35 permanent jobs will be created. Also, where is the part that says the crap pushed through the pipeline would stay in the U.S.? Oil products are sold on a global market, so this is NOT “American oil.”
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    When it inevitably leaks/cracks/spills, how will it be cleaned up? Paper towels? Workers are STILL trying to clean the dilbit from the Kalamazoo, THREE YEARS after the spill.

  • Tom May 9, 2013 at 11:00 pm

    Move over, Orrin and Mike. We have another bought and paid for political representative.

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